Crosley, Doug - New Star in Town

Tracks

Side 1

		Track Name	Length
	1	If She Should Come To You (La Montana)	02:33
	2	Dear Heart	03:01
	3	Forever Isn't Long Enough	02:29
	4	Unchained Melody	03:08
	5	Why Did I Choose You	03:19
	6	I Could Have Told You	02:33

Side 2

		Track Name	Length
	1	Forget Domani (Forget Tomorrow)	02:36
	2	I Will Follow You (Chariot)	02:29
	3	Lonely Girl	02:48
	4	I'm Always Chasing Rainbows	03:16
	5	Somebody Somewhere	02:44
	6	For All We Know	02:52

Photos

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Information/Write-up

Canada’s smooth baritone and musical ambassador to television, stage, and record.

Doug Crosley was born in 1936 in Toronto and raised in Oshawa, Ontario, where his lifelong love of singing began in Sunday school and the St. Andrews church choir. While working at General Motors in the engineering department, he entered a local talent show and won over the crowd with “A White Sport Coat (And a Pink Carnation).” That performance launched a professional career that would span more than four decades across Canada and the United States.

In the late 1950s, Crosley began appearing on national television, guesting on CBC programs such as Country Club, Holiday Ranch, Swing Easy, and The Canadian Hit Parade. By the early 1960s, he moved to Winnipeg to host Swing Along, a CBC television variety series. It was there he met his future wife, Jean (Gray), and began raising a family.

Crosley’s breakthrough in the U.S. came when he performed on The Bell Telephone Hour at the Brooklyn Theatre in New York City. This exposure led to a recording contract with RCA Victor, and in 1965 he released his debut LP New Star in Town, arranged by Jack Pleis, Charles Fox, and Marty Manning. The album showcased his romantic balladeer style and featured a blend of contemporary pop and American standards. His follow-up album, Let the Heartaches Begin (Arc AS 266), was released as part of the Arc Centennial Series and featured renditions of contemporary hits and originals.

Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Crosley remained a familiar face on both Canadian and American television. He made appearances on Juliette and Friends, The Merv Griffin Show, The Mike Douglas Show, and The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. In the 1970s, he hosted his own nationally broadcast CBC series, The Doug Crosley Show, produced out of Winnipeg. He also emceed numerous industrial shows for General Motors and Chrysler across North America, further blending corporate performance with entertainment.

Crosley was also an accomplished stage actor, starring in lead roles in musical theatre productions including Oklahoma!, Bye Bye Birdie, Guys and Dolls, and Brigadoon. His charisma and warmth made him a natural frontman, whether in the studio, on screen, or under the stage lights.

In addition to his commercial releases, Crosley contributed to several broadcast-only LPs produced by CBC Radio Canada. These include From CBC Toronto (LM 30), arranged by Doug Randle, and From CBC Toronto (LM 09) with the Pat Riccio Orchestra — both part of the rare LM series issued for internal broadcast use across the CBC network.

Later in life, Crosley continued to perform with big bands throughout the United States, particularly in Palm Springs and south Florida. He spent his summers in Lakefield, Ontario, overlooking Chemong Lake, with his longtime partner Mary Elliott. Even in his later years, friends recalled his voice as strong and emotive as ever, offering private concerts and musical storytelling to visitors.

Doug Crosley passed away on March 22, 2019, in Oshawa, Ontario, at the age of 83. He is remembered not only for his voice and poise, but for his generosity, humour, and enduring love of performance. His legacy lives on through his recordings, televised appearances, and the countless lives he touched on and off stage.
-Robert Williston

Arranged and Conducted by Jack Pleis, Charles Fox, and Marty Manning
Produced by Jim Foglesong
Engineered by Ernie Oelrich
Recorded at Webster Hall, New York City, NY, USA

Liner notes:
romantic ballads for dreaming...
Feel the need of a dream? The word is out: Doug Crosley has arrived, and dreaming will never again be the same.

He is, after all, the very stuff dreams are made of. Where to start? He's young—still in his early twenties, he's handsome—and then, there’s his voice. Oh, but he can sing! A song spinner, a mood setter, he has smoothed the special sort of scene—intimate, warm, vibrant, mellow. He points the way to romantic reverie as he sings of love-lost and -found. The pace varies: soft, ethereal, wistful, he seduces, but in a crescendo of bright hope, he dares the recapture of lost love, to cherish the dreamer and then the dream.

It is this Doug’s first American album; he’s Canadian born and bred, with many another star on his musical panel (Paul Anka and Robert Goulet, for instance), he made his mark at home first. His first big break came on the hugely popular Toronto-TV nightly series Music Hop, produced by CBC Toronto’s Tommy Common and Stan Jacobson. National Broadcasting Corporation producer saw the show’s tremendous success and decided to import a number of young Canadian performers to Canadian studios as a springboard for radio and TV acts in eastern Canada and in leading Canadian border U.S. cities. Doug Crosley was one of those picked for this program; once again he made his mark—a deeply experience working in front of an audience: he came off with poise, confidence and warmth.

Next, Doug moved off to Winnipeg to try his hand at summer theater, but before long he was tapped by the CBC there to become the singing host for a summer TV series to be called “Swingalong.” It was scheduled for thirteen weeks; it lasted through the winter—by popular demand, to coin a phrase. The next summer the same thing happened.

Doug had the starring role in the CBC-TV network “The World of Music.” He’s also guested on Canada’s highest rated TV variety show, “Parade,” and, altogether, in his career has appeared on more than one hundred television shows and has been heard on more than one hundred and fifty radio variety programs. Doug Crosley has appeared with some of the most notable personalities in the musical field; he’s shared microphones with Patti Page (he appeared with her on the CBC-TV national show) and with Roger Williams. He’s sung the selection of dreamy melodies like Henry Mancini’s Dear Heart and Frank Loesser’s Hear! Hear!

There’s nothing formulaic about Doug Crosley. He makes each ballad—“I Will Follow You,” “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows,” “Unchained Melody,” “Somebody Somewhere,” the Peggy Wood favorite from “Plain and Fancy,” plus “Somebody Somewhere” from “The Most Happy Fella” and “For All We Know,” and the great torch “I Could Have Told You,” and makes them all his own.

He’s also sung the lovely “Lonely Girl,” the wistful “Why Did I Choose You?” and “Forever Isn’t Long Enough,” not to mention “If She Should Come to You.”

In the songs he sings and in the images he draws, Doug Crosley takes the listener to another world: a world of romance, new enchantment, touching by the brilliance of this new star in town.

DYNAGROOVE

This RCA Victor Dynagroove recording is the newest step in the continuing progress of musical reproduction. It combines the latest electronic technology and new studio techniques—including RCA Victor’s exclusive Dynagroove process—to add a new dimension of fidelity and brilliance to the sound of the music.

A “New Orthophonic” High Fidelity Recording

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